Photographer Andrius Burba is the creator of Underlook, best known for its underside view of cats. He recently undertook the biggest project of his life with an underside view… of horses.

Andrius Burba. Reprinted with permission.

Few people can say they’ve gotten a sustained look at the total underside of a horse before. (Other than perhaps my husband, who was run over by a herd of Haflingers in his teenage years and still hasn’t quite gotten over it.) Horses are certainly never photographed from that angle — until now.

Lithuanian photographer Andrius Burba started the Underlook project, first with a series of images called “Under-Cats.” He placed cats on glass and photographed them from underneath, at first purely out of curiosity to see what they looked like from that angle. The project went viral, and Burba has since produced books and prints of Under-Cats, as well as similar series titled Under-Dogs and Under-Rabbits.

When Burba sought to go bigger and replicate his style with horses, he knew he was in for a challenge. According to his description:

“Once I had a crazy idea to take a photo of a horse from underneath, today I have results from my most difficult photoshoot I have ever had. It all started with a project Under-cats. After it reach a high interest I decided to make a far bigger project. I looked for different examples of what was done on the internet and after no similar results I decided that I have to do it and be the first person to shoot a standing horse form underneath. As I started to organise the photoshoot of a horse I knew that all I needed is to get 600 kg horse on a glass, dig 3 meters in to the ground, put my camera under a big glass and take a shot. Even though it was the same concept as project “Under-Cats” it took two months to organise it all. I have found horse friendly environment and even made rubber horse shoes, to save the glass from scratching.

“If last time I needed help from one person, this time I had more than 40 persons crew to make this crazy project come to life, which I could not make without them.

“In the end we got these fascinating photographs that have never been created before.”

Andrius Burba. Reprinted with permission.

The images themselves are stunning and completely out of the ordinary realm of equine photography, but realizing the amount of work and coordination that had to come together to make such an image possible is mind-blowing. (View the full gallery here via Burba’s Underlook Facebook page.)

Fortunately, the Underlook team produced a behind-the-scenes video to give viewers an idea of the carefully-orchestrated work that went into these photographs:

Burba’s next project goal is to work with more large animals — he hopes to have a series called Under-Big-Cats starring tigers. To help support this endeavor, Underlook is selling a limited edition of Under-Horse prints — if you love these images, don’t hesitate, as they won’t last long!